Uncertainty assessment in the stratigraphic well correlation of a carbonate ramp: Method and application to the Beausset Basin, SE France

Abstract

We assess stratigraphic correlation uncertainties by stochastically generating several possible correlations lines between a set of stratigraphic logs. We motivate the use of automatic correlation methods to sample this uncertainty and introduce a stochastic version of Dynamic Time Warping (DTW) which correlates two logs. This method is extended to a larger number of logs using a sequential application of DTW. When available, low frequency stratigraphic events are correlated first, and then used to constrain the correlation of higher-order events. All DTW variants use elementary correlation costs corresponding to the likelihood of each possible horizon. The method is demonstrated on a carbonate ramp of the Cretaceous southern Provence Basin, S-E France, using costs which measure the consistency between the computed platform slope angle and a theoretical depositional profile. We show that these correlation uncertainties significantly impact facies proportions in stratigraphic layers.

Download / Links

BibTeX Reference

@ARTICLE{,
author = { Lallier, Florent and Caumon, Guillaume and Borgomano, Jean and Viseur, Sophie and Royer, Jean-Jacques and Antoine, Christophe },
title = { Uncertainty assessment in the stratigraphic well correlation of a carbonate ramp: Method and application to the Beausset Basin, SE France },
journal = { Comptes Rendus Geoscience },
volume = { 348 },
number = { 7 },
year = { 2016 },
pages = { 499-509 },
doi = { 10.1016/j.crte.2015.10.002 },
abstract = { We assess stratigraphic correlation uncertainties by stochastically generating several possible correlations lines between a set of stratigraphic logs. We motivate the use of automatic correlation methods to sample this uncertainty and introduce a stochastic version of Dynamic Time Warping (DTW) which correlates two logs. This method is extended to a larger number of logs using a sequential application of DTW. When available, low frequency stratigraphic events are correlated first, and then used to constrain the correlation of higher-order events. All DTW variants use elementary correlation costs corresponding to the likelihood of each possible horizon. The method is demonstrated on a carbonate ramp of the Cretaceous southern Provence Basin, S-E France, using costs which measure the consistency between the computed platform slope angle and a theoretical depositional profile. We show that these correlation uncertainties significantly impact facies proportions in stratigraphic layers. }
}